US and Iranian delegations held talks in Rome on Saturday on Tehran’s nuclear program with further meetings planned for next week.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi described the talks as constructive.

The delegations held four rounds of indirect talks at the Omani embassy in Rome. Omani counterpart Badr Albusaidi shuttled between the rooms, delivering messages exchanged by the two sides.

“This time we managed to reach a better understanding about some principles and goals. Ultimately it was agreed that the talks continue and we enter the next stage and expert meetings start. Starting this Wednesday, technical meetings at experts level will start in Oman,” said Araghchi.

A third round of talks in Oman on April 26.

Donald Trump who in 2018 unilaterally abandoned a landmark nuclear accord signed and brokered by world powers in 2015 has demanded a new deal with Tehran and threatened to bomb it.

A significant step by South Africa’s legal system in confronting the atrocities of the country’s dark political past. 

A judge this week approved the trial of two apartheid-era police officers for their involvement in the 1982 assassination of three student activists.

The prosecution is unprecedented. Until now, no individual had been held accountable for the crime of apartheid.

The case centers around three young freedome fighters killed in an explosion in 1982. The victims were part of a resistance movement opposed to the apartheid regime which enforced White-only rule and domination over the Black majority.

Experts say the trial could open the door for others.

Also this week, South Africa reopened an investigation into the death Albert Luthuli, a former president of the African National Congress (ANC) and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who was killed in 1967.

The prosecuting authority seeks to have the findings of previous inquests into Luthuli overturned.

The authorities at the time had concluded that Luthuli’s death the result of an accident.

The development comes more than 30 years since South Africa became a democracy and after a Truth commission unearted numerous atrocities.

Tunisia on Friday handed opponents of President Kais Saied lengthy jail terms after convicting them of plotting against state security.

Issam Chebbi and Jawhar Ben Mbarek of the opposition National Salvation Front coalition, as well as lawyer Ridha Belhaj and activist Chaima Issa, were sentenced to 18 years behind bars, their lawyer said.

Businessman Kamel Eltaief received the harshest penalty of 66 years in prison.

They are among forty people, including high-profile politicians, businessmen and journalists, who who were being prosecuted on security and terrorism charges.

Critics say the charges lacked merit, and only served to consolidate Saied’s power grab.

The president won re-election virtually unchallenged last year after the jailing or disqualification on flimsy grounds of his opponents.

Saied has ruled mostly by decree since dismissing parliament in 2022 and promulgating a revised constitution giving himself wideranging powers in 2023.